Making Bears ‘Family’ Sets Everybody Up For Maiming, Death

A popular social media video that opens with a bear showing up at a family’s front door, set to a sappy love song with cute emojis littered throughout is put out there as a heartwarming tale of nature communing with humans.

What the video really shows is a level of ignorance and interaction with one of the planet’s apex predators that’s really just incredibly stupid, wildlife experts told Cowboy State Daily.

Stupid, and dangerous — for bears and people alike — they said.

At one point, what appears to be mature black bear is suddenly standing in a family’s doorway, practically inside their front room.

“That’s not a place you ever want to be,” said Colorado Parks & Wildlife Northeast region spokeswoman Kara Van Hoose.

“That’s a wild animal. A bear is a big, powerful animal,” she added. “They bite, they scratch, they can stomp you. You’re not going to win a fight against a bear.”

According to the video, the now-mature bear had apparently returned to the home after it was discovered by the family as a cub and raised there until finally being released when grown.

Van Hoose is no stranger to close encounters with bears. Black bears are thriving in her part of the Centennial State, and her agency frequently must haze them away from settled areas.

In May, they tried unsuccessfully to frighten a bear out of a tree in Golden, Colorado, by blasting heavy metal music at it from drone speakers. The bear stubbornly stayed in the tree until nightfall, before finally leaving on its own.

But even though wildlife agents might have unintentionally made a metalhead out of that particular bear, that doesn’t mean people should be inviting bears to come live with them, as supposedly depicted in the video.

“We never want bears breaking into houses, even if you think that bear is tame,” Van Hoose said.

A Bear Love Story?

The premise of the video is that a kind family adopted an orphaned bear cub, providing it food, shelter and even letting the kids play with it as if it were a puppy.

Then the bear, ever grateful to its loving human friends, returns to visit as an adult — at one point, even bringing her own cubs over to meet her adopted family.

Over a soundtrack of the pop music love ballad “Perfect” by Ed Sheeran, various sappy interactions between humans and bears are depicted.

Some people in the comments section noted that the video was so touching and emotional, it brought them to tears.

A Mash-Up Of Stupidity

In reality, the only tears shed would probably be over the ghastly wounds to the humans when the bear eventually mauls them.

And then perhaps more tears would be shed over the bear being killed, which is usually what happens when a bear attacks people.

“While I do believe bears and humans can coexist, videos like this are dangerous for both. A habituated bear will most likely be killed, and a hungry habituated bear will eventually cause damage,” said Amy Kidwell, who runs Idaho Black Bear Rehab (IBBR).

“It is bad for bears and bad for people to encourage this type of interaction,” she said.

IBBR rescues and rehabilitates black bear cubs, including bears from Wyoming.

But Kidwell is a certified professional and her goal is to return the bears to the wild, not to try making house pets out of them.

The video also seems poorly produced. It depicts multiple bears, and maybe even more than once species — black bears and grizzlies

“This video is odd. It's not the same bear throughout the video,” Kidwell said.

Wyoming Game and Fish Large Carnivore Specialist Dan Thompson said he also questions the validity of the video and thinks it’s a compilation of unrelated clips.

The video shows “multiple bears, multiple species and an overarching message that creates a false sense of reality and encourages terrible human behavior that only has negative ramifications for wildlife and people alike,” Thompson said.

Van Hoose agreed that the video seems strange and poorly-produced.

“This is not one bear. This is a mash-up of different bears. I don’t even know if the adult bears that are shown are the same bears as the cubs that are shown in different scenes,” she said.

Just Don’t Do It

Van Hoose said that she hopes most people who view the video realize the idea it conveys is dumb and dangerous. But such “cute” videos of people supposedly adopting bears can make the jobs of professionals more difficult.

“The bears shown in this video are food-conditioned,” she said. “I think videos like this contribute to the habituation of bears.”

The video idealizing bears as good companion animals is cringy, she said, and sends a horrible message.

“For some people, when you see other people trying it, they thought might cross your mind to try it too,” she said.

Only certified wildlife sanctuaries should take in bear cubs, Van Hoose added.

“Bears’ place is not with humans,” she said. “We can’t provide them the same life they can get in the wild.”

Kidwell said the video and others like it undermine the value of the work she and her staff do at IBBR.

“That cub could have been rehabilitated in a way that would discourage her from seeking out humans, and she and her cubs could have long and successful lives in the wild,” she said. “Raising a bear like a pet and then setting it free is extremely irresponsible.”

Contact Mark Heinz at mark@cowboystatedaily.com

Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.